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alexblanchet.bsky.social
Political Scientist | Former academic | Now Lead Research Scientist in the financial industry | Dad 2x | Runner 🏃‍♂️ Posts in English & Français 📍Montréal, Québec, Canada
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Worth a watch. youtu.be/baR4logaaOQ?...

Really important story - army officials asked soldiers to identify themselves if they don't agree with Trump's politics that way he'd get only supportive soldiers in uniform during his political rally on base. Heavier soldiers were also barred from participating.

The level of paranoia within the Trump and Musk camps must be intense.

I’m not blogging at all this month (revising the book manuscript), but if I wasn’t on blogging-hiatus, here’s what I’d be writing: (1) An awful lot of centrist pundit-types built their careers in the ‘10s around writing takes that perform well on algorithmic media.

I've found myself using the f-word a lot lately. Fascism. There's a lot of it about. People don't like to say it because it makes them uncomfortable. It seems extreme. Well, fascism is extreme and you can't ignore it. Get used to it. Start using the f-word.

L’hypocrisie flagrante à chaque jours… En permanence et sans complexe.

He’d televise executions if he could.

Someone alert Jake Tapper that the president is having imaginary phone calls with the governor of California.

So this is insane.

Protests across the country are a sign of weakness. Attempting to turn the military against the American people 6 months into your term is a sign of weakness. Don’t believe the anti-anti-Trump people in both parties who have always been in awe of Trump. They’re still wrong.

U.S. Correspondent Lauren Tomasi has been caught in the crossfire as the LAPD fired rubber bullets at protesters in Los Angeles. via @9newsaus.bsky.social

In the last 20 or so minutes I’ve seen LAPD officers shove women to the ground without provocation, rip a sign out of a man’s hand and then swing a baton into his leg and raise a less-lethal launcher to aim directly at a protester (which I’m 99% is a major policy violation.)

Give the photographer the Pulitzer Prize

The best scientific evidence is that the 2020 BLM protests helped defeat Trump in the election. These protests are likely doing the same. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Thoughts and prayers for the MAGA warriors who are being personally traumatized by this scene

Welcome to America, where protesting illegal kidnappings without due process is an insurrection, but attacking the nation’s Capitol is not.

L’été va être chaud…

In order to eliminate any inconvenience to cars, we’ve made it illegal for children to be children

🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿

En raison de la grève à la STM, les parents d'enfants en garderie se font demander d'aller chercher leurs enfant à 17h la semaine prochaine. Les enfants se font annuler leurs sorties scolaires de fin d'annÊes et les ÊvÊnements professionnels s'annulent l'un après l'autre. #ServicesEssentiels

Hi! I specialize in medication toxicity. All available, real-world data has proven mifepristone is actually even safer than many over the counter medicines. Mortality rates: Mifepristone: 0.65/100,000 Penicillin 2/100K Viagra 4/100K Pregnancy in the US: 22/100,000 (some states see rates >60/100K)

1938

Let me put it this way: Apple has all the money it could ever want. It can afford to pay the full cost of making iPhones. Instead, Harvard et al. subsidize Apple by educating its future employees. But … (1/2)

to all the "your findings don't surprise me" warriors.

Harvard university’s top governing board, the Harvard Corporation, decided this month to revoke Francesca Gino’s tenure and end her employment at Harvard Business School www.wgbh.org/news/educati...

Shorter version: "I'm such a naive dupe."

Here is the official Harvard University website! www.harvard.edu Here is their # if you'd like to speak to someone there!! +1 617-495-1000 The link to the Free Government courses is ... pll.harvard.edu/subject/gove...

"In America, the richest men are taking satisfaction in abandoning the world's poorest children to sickness and death."

Le génie qui s’inquiète des déficits commerciaux de son pays est en train de démolir ce qui est certainement la plus grande exportation de son pays… Quel délire. apple.news/AZzlAKy8aQ5m...

I humbly submit that before the Democratic Party tries to save itself by finding a "Joe Rogan of the Left" they should seek rigorous evidence that the actual Joe Rogan had a measurable impact on Republican support.

JUST IN 🚨: U.S. 30-Year Treasury Yield jumps above 5%

A US deficit of $2.3 trillion is about 7.5% of expected US GDP in 2026. Canada is in the range of 2% defict/GDP. Their 10 year bond is about 4.5%; ours is about 3.5%.

Liberal arts majors rise up www.cnbc.com/2025/05/16/c...

This is not helping my gut feeling that everyone who claims they thoroughly check their AI outputs is lying (because if they did it would negate all efficiencies). What chance the “only” time it wasn’t checked is the time all the errors are so obvious? And no one will learn anything from this.

The crisis we face in our country is not Trump, the way every claim he makes is a lie, his admissions of grift, or his destruction of the integrity of the country. No, the crisis in our country is the nodding & smiling of the people on either side of him - one of whom is the speaker of the House.

When Elon Musk bought Twitter, the Guardian asked me to write a piece on what he hoped to accomplish. I wrote that he was a fascist (like Henry Ford) who would turn Twitter into a fascist propaganda website. They killed the piece (didn’t even offer to edit it)! Anyway,

Excellente nouvelle. Et 30M$ me semble assez peu cher payĂŠ pour ce qui pourrait bien devenir un Amazon canadien. www.journaldemontreal.com/2025/05/15/c...

Misère…

Il y a clairement des gens qui lui ont expliqué récemment ce que faire l’épicerie voulait dire. Une vieille pratique paysanne…

"We Study Fascism. And We’re Leaving the U.S." @marcishore.bsky.social, @timothysnyder.bsky.social & Jason Stanley, all professors at Yale & experts in authoritarianism, explain why America is especially vulnerable to a democratic backsliding and why they are leaving www.nytimes.com/2025/05/14/o...

The free world is taking note of Congress’s inaction. Whatever damage Trump does to America’s alliances becomes exponentially harder to repair, as congressional inaction must eventually be seen as tacit approval.Half of the political class no longer supports even the most basic democratic principles

My thought of the Qatari jet is that the moment Trump is out of office, the net president ought to seize it and sell it on the grounds that based on the emoluments clause, it could never have been a gift to Trump personally and so must have been a gift to the federal government.

For everyone who was like “Google search is getting worse,” we were absolutely right.

If you encounter what seems like an implausible survey finding, ask: 1. Were survey respondents selected randomly or was this an opt-in poll? 2. Could the results, especially for young adults, be driven by bogus respondents? Keep this post in mind: www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/...